Journal of Tourism and Development

Journal of Tourism and Development

The Impact of Tour Guides' Cultural Intelligence on tourists' Digital Loyalty: Examining the Role of Instagram in Online Word-of-Mouth Marketing among Inbound Tourists to Yazd Province

Articles in Press

Document Type : Original Article

Authors
Hossein Zakeri 1
Akbar Pourfaraj 2
Mohammad Khalili 3
1 Tourism management, faculty of accounting and management, allameh tabatabai university, tehran, Iran
2 Allameh Tabataba'i University-Tehran- tehran city- IR
3 Tourism management- University of scince and culture of tehran-tehran city- IR
10.22034/jtd.2026.577838.3193
Abstract
In the contemporary tourism industry, the quality of cultural interaction has become a key factor in attracting and retaining tourists. This study aimed to investigate the impact of tour guides' cultural intelligence on the digital loyalty of inbound tourists to Yazd Province, considering the mediating role of online word-of-mouth marketing on the Instagram platform. The present study is applied in purpose and descriptive-correlational in method, conducted as a survey using structural equation modeling (SEM). The required data were collected through a researcher-made questionnaire, whose validity and reliability were confirmed, from 208 international tourists in Yazd and analyzed using SPSS and Amos software. The findings revealed that tour guides' cultural intelligence has a positive and direct impact on tourists' digital loyalty (with a path coefficient of 0.495). Furthermore, cultural intelligence indirectly influences digital loyalty (with a coefficient of 0.242) by enhancing online word-of-mouth marketing on Instagram (with a path coefficient of 0.612). Online word-of-mouth marketing also has a positive and significant impact (0.396) on digital loyalty on its own. Overall, the results indicate that tour guides with high cultural intelligence not only enrich tourists' direct experience but also significantly contribute to the formation of digital loyalty and a positive brand image for the destination by encouraging them to actively share positive experiences in the digital space.
Keywords
Cultural intelligence
tour guides
digital loyalty
Instagram
online word-of-mouth marketing
Journal of Tourism and Development

Articles in Press, Accepted Manuscript
Available Online from 31 May 2026